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- Issue No. 164: 10 BEST Productivity Tips for Google Docs!
Issue No. 164: 10 BEST Productivity Tips for Google Docs!
Is 'Purpose' what's really missing from your productivity toolkit?
Jenae Spry
March 14, 2025
Productivity Express
Issue No. 164
The Best in Evidenced-Based Productivity
for Small Business Owners, Freelancers & Founders
Helping You Work Smarter and Live More
The Rundown
The Power of Purpose
How to Use Your Introversion to Make You a Better Leader
How I wrote a book in 15 minutes a day
10 BEST Productivity Tips for Google Docs!
I Used ChatGPT’s Advanced Voice Mode. It’s Fun, and Just a Bit Creepy
Add this book to your reading list
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🔥Quote/Prompt
…All appears to change when we change.
Use the quote as a writing or thinking prompt to finish your week strong.
A bit from mine:
(posted in our Doer Entrepreneurs Free Community — off social media)
Can I get a 👏 for Henri-Frédéric Amiel? This quote perfectly captures what I see again and again with my clients (and myself).
It's OK to […]
Did someone forward this to you?
📈 Performance
Finding your "why" sounds like self-help fluff until you're staring at a mountain of work wondering why you even started this business in the first place. This research-backed exploration shows how having a clear purpose isn't just for vision board enthusiasts—it's actually your secret weapon for mental resilience.
Having a sense of purpose goes beyond just feeling good—it fundamentally changes how your brain processes challenges. Studies consistently show purpose-driven individuals experience lower anxiety, better stress management, and greater resilience when facing obstacles. This neurological advantage creates a buffer against burnout and keeps you focused on what matters when everything hits the fan.
Key Insights:
Your amygdala (that pesky fear center in your brain) loves to sabotage your big goals by triggering procrastination and self-doubt—addressing these fear responses directly is key to breaking through plateaus.
Purpose-driven people actively seek learning opportunities rather than avoiding challenges, creating a positive growth cycle that compounds over time.
When your actions align with your core values, the resulting psychological coherence reduces stress significantly and improves decision-making quality.
Read the full article for five practical exercises to identify your purpose and science-backed strategies to overcome the brain's natural resistance to change.
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⚙️ Optimization
Those "born leader" types who command every room they enter? Turns out they're not actually better leaders—just louder ones. This refreshing take on leadership shows how your quiet tendencies might actually be your secret management superpower.
Introverts often take more time to process information, exploring issues with greater depth rather than immediately jumping to solutions. This deliberate approach allows them to notice subtle details others miss and develop more thoughtful responses. What extroverts might dismiss as 'being stuck in your head' often results in more innovative problem-solving and empathetic leadership decisions.
Key Insights:
Silence can be a strategic tool—when you don't immediately offer solutions, you empower team members to develop their own answers, fostering independence rather than dependence.
That deep listening ability you've always had isn't just a personality quirk—it's what executive coaches call a "natural superpower" that increases your likability and helps you understand what your team actually needs.
The pressure to "network more" misses the point—introverts excel at building fewer but deeper relationships, creating stronger loyalty and understanding than superficial connections ever could.
Read the full article for specific strategies for handling draining leadership situations like public speaking and networking, plus examples of successful introvert-extrovert leadership partnerships like Jobs and Wozniak.
⏲️ Time Management
Staring at a half-finished creative project that's been collecting digital dust for months? Stop waiting for that mythical "perfect writing day" with hours of uninterrupted focus. This refreshingly honest approach from a published novelist proves the "I don't have time" excuse is actually BS.
There is nothing magic about 15 minutes—and yet there is. We all waste 15 minutes every day scrolling on our phones. And in 15 minutes, if you can write 100 words, you can have a full-length draft of a novel in two years. Will what you write be ready to publish? No. First drafts never are. Part of the 15-minute technique is to give yourself permission to write badly. You'll fix it later.
Key Insights:
The myth of needing "three hours to write" is actually counterproductive—most of that time gets wasted on squirming, checking the internet, and daydreaming anyway.
Consistency beats perfection every time—100 words daily adds up to 73,000 words in two years, which is a complete novel draft.
Daily micro-sessions keep your project alive in your subconscious, so your brain keeps working on problems even when you're not actively writing.
Read the full article for practical advice on finding your optimal 15-minute window, how to train your brain to think about your project during downtime, and why most published authors still have day jobs.
💻 Tools & Technology
Google Docs is awesome. How did we live without it? 🙂 But I learned so many new things in this video that I have absolutely been missing out on! Fortunately, the creator was kind enough to timestamp his video so here they are linked:
00:00 Top 10 Google Doc Tips for Productivity
00:11 Use Building Blocks to Save Time
02:09 Enable Pageless Mode in Google Docs
04:02 Set Default Fonts in Google Docs
06:34 Link to Headings and Comments
07:20 Preview Suggested Edits
08:58 Compose Email from Google Docs
10:41 Email as PDF Shortcut
11:29 Tips and Tricks for Tables
12:31 Quality of Life Features in Google Docs
🤖 AI
That "personal AI assistant" you've been hearing about isn't going to be a fancy app on your phone—it's going to be living in your glasses, watching everything you do, and becoming unsettlingly good at anticipating what you need. This forward-looking analysis explains why 2025 will mark the shift from AI tools to AI abilities.
"The context-aware AI agent will share your reality. It's not just tracking your location like GPS, it is seeing, hearing and paying attention to what you are paying attention to. This will make it feel far less like a tool, and far more like an internal ability that is linked to your first-person reality. And when we are asked a question by the AI-powered alter ego in our ears, we will often answer by just nodding our heads to affirm or shaking our heads to reject. It will feel so natural and seamless, we might not even consciously realize we replied."
Key Insights:
The distinction between tools and abilities isn't just semantic—tools are external artifacts we use, while abilities feel internally embodied like language or math skills.
By 2030, most of us will have AI agents that travel with us through our daily lives, first through whispering, then through "mouthing" words, and eventually through subtle muscle signals.
Meta and Google are already positioning themselves in this space, with Meta adding context-aware AI to Ray-Ban glasses and Google announcing Android XR for seamless augmentation.
Read the full article for a three-stage timeline of how these technologies will evolve through 2035, potential risks, and why subscription models might be the best path to avoid dystopian outcomes.
👀 Read, Watch, Listen
This week’s awesome books, YouTube videos, newsletters, etc. to add to your list!
"Building a StoryBrand" by Donald Miller presents a proven system for effective marketing communication. Miller argues that businesses often struggle to connect with customers due to unclear messaging, resulting in lost revenue. The book introduces the StoryBrand process, which applies seven universal elements of storytelling to marketing. This approach helps businesses create a clear, compelling message that resonates with customers, ultimately improving engagement and sales. Miller teaches readers how to simplify their brand message, understand customer motivations, and create effective content for various platforms. The book promises to transform how businesses communicate their value, regardless of industry or company size.
🎉 Celebration Corner
Every week Doers Inner Circle members do a weekly review & get help when they need it — check out the progress they made this week!
3 hot leads from the [business] forum or through LI.
2 dormant clients coming back after 2-3 years silence!
Making progress and gathering the necessary elements for [business] creation.
What did you do this week? We feature non-member successes too. Just post them here!
🔒Inner Circle: Events & Announcements
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I hope you found this valuable!
Wishing you much productivity!
- Jenae :)
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